Wired News: EBay Scam Uses IPods as Bait

This is a great article about the "matrix scams" being perpetrated on eBay. You know the ones. They appear to offer iPods for dirt cheap or free, but they are simply pyramid schemes designed to get you and 6 or 7 of your closest friends to sign up for music clubs and other services which cost money.

Here's my favorite part of the article:

EBay spokesman Hani Durzy said he was unaware of the scams. However, he said eBay allows some informational listings as long as they are clearly marked and placed in the correct categories. If an auction is in violation of the policy it will be removed, and repeat violators are banned.

"We have 20 million items on the site at any one time. In the grand scheme of things it is insignificant," Durzy said, referring to the large number of matrix listings on eBay.

Huh? He is "unaware" of these types of listings? Come on! That's simply unbelievable. All you have to do is search for an iPod and you'll see dozens of these types of scams. The bottom line is eBay makes money off these listings, so they are not likely to take them down. Monster.com has had similar problems with fake job postings and work at home scams. The perpetrators are paying them, so they are in no hurry to put a stop to it. What these companies need to realize is that scams like this undermine their credibility and hurt them in the long run.

Gumshoo.com does a good job of identifying these kind of scams. If you're fed up with all the noise on eBay thanks to these types of information only listings, I'd recommend you give it a try.

www.gumshoo.com